Several years ago,both menexplicitly pledged in writing to oppose tax increases on the people of Hawaii. Each of them signed the ATR's Taxpayer Protection Pledgeand explicitly promised to"oppose and vote against any and all efforts to increase taxes."

Despite the liberal readership of Civil Beat, response to McDermott's most recent call in his ongoing public campaign for higher taxes and wasteful spending has beenoverwhelmingly scathing. Check out theangry comments from readers.

One of these comes from Malosi Hamo, a frequent Civil Beat commenter, who writes: "It is truly sad that Bob McDermott is proving by himself to be more of a DEMOCRAT these days, championing the Democratic cause forMORE TAXES so the Government can give usMORE STUFF! . . .McDermott is single-handedly proving (HIRA's Eric) Ryan correct (about RINO's taking over the GOP in Hawaii)!!"

HIRA can't argue with that. But while closet Democrat Bob McDermott's 2018 gubernatorial campaign is probably toast, the Hawaii GOP's sole candidate for governor ostensibly plans to burn down what's left of the Republican Party in the meantime by publicly endorsing and pursuing destructive Democrat policies. Meanwhile liberal state party leaders, old and new, seem determined to help 'RINO Bob' achieve his objectiveby remaining completely silent.

TOTAL SILENCE ON THE CALL FOR BILLIONS IN NEW TAXES: Where is the Hawaii GOP's new chairwoman Shirlene Ostrov ?? Where is the minority caucus leader Andria Tupola? They must be as deaf, dumb and mute as Helen Keller. So much for the speeches about "two strong women" that GOP delegates heard during the Kauai state convention two weeks ago. Seriously,Helen Keller had more to say in 5 minutes than these faux GOP "leaders" have shown before or since Kauai.

In the past few days alone, Hawaii Democrats have trashed Trump's proposed budget. What do we hearfrom the overpriced GOP headquarters on Kapiolani? NOTHING. Same goes for Trump's Obamacare reform, Trump's review of Obama's prohibition on fishing in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, Trump's heavy vetting program for Middle Eastern immigrants, tourists, and refugees, et cetera. Efforts to take on state and local Democrats over state and local issues have been nonexistent as well. Ostrov and Tupola are merely 'two silent women' who would rather be doing something else than lead the GOP fight in Hawaii.

Worst of all, as far as island voters are concerned, billions of dollars of broken promises are no big deal and the official sloganof the Hawaii Republican Party is: "What do we want? Higher Taxes! When do we want it? NOW!!"

Now, stop and ask yourself the obvious questions: Would a real, bona-fide GOP gubernatorial candidate push for billions and billions in permanently higher taxes to waste your money on and billions billions in wasteful spending? Will embracingbillions in higher taxes for wasteful spending help toendear Republicans to the voters of Hawaii? Can campaigning between now and 2018 on an identical vision as Democrats for an overtaxed Hawaii be better than offering a competing vision of a more affordable Hawaii? Will Republican leaders denounce this RINO clown who rips his anti-tax pledge to shreds in an effort to destroy the Hawaii GOP??

[Answer Key: No, No, No, No.]

When the 2018 GOP candidate for governor calls for a special session to hike taxes, party leaders must speak twice as loudly to go in the opposite direction. Despite the delusion of RINO's like McDermott and his idols on the Democrat side of the aisle, there'snothing 'generous' about spending other people's money and there's nothing 'courageous' about confiscating it from them through higher taxes. Tragically, party leaders like Ostrov, Tupola, Hellreich, and Saiki have expressed no disagreement with McDermott, probably because they don't disagree with him. Heck, McDermott endorsed each one of them for state party office. And here's why . . .

Anyone paying attention over the past few decades of decline for the state party understands that there is only one strategy which RINO party leaders believe in. It's called being "candidate centric" and it explains several things: (1) the weak Republicans we have in office; (2) the deafening silence of party leaders; (3) the unwillingness of voters to take Republicans seriously as an alternative.

The goal of liberals who continue to control the Hawaii GOP after decades of obvious political failure is to 'help' Republican candidates and incumbents by letting anybody say that he/she is Republican and take any position on any issue in order to out-Democrat Democrats. The candidate centric approach 'empowers' anybody in office (or running for office) decide for himself or herself what it means to be a Republican by taking any position on any issue. Tax increases are Republican. Abortion on demand is Republican. Wasteful spending is Republican. Hawaii's shipping monopoly is Republican. And so on, as long as either Bob McDermott or Lauren Cheape or Gene Ward or Jaci Agustin embrace Democrat policies. Now these can be Republican policies too. ANYTHING GOES!!! And Shirlene Ostrov's puppetmaster Pat Saiki has explicitly said so on television . . .

So when our party's candidate for governor in 2018, Bob McDermott, goes unchallenged while calling for a permanent tax hike of hundreds of millions of dollars per year forever, Shirlene Ostrov and her puppetmasters Miriam Hellreich and Pat Saiki are merely implementing their longstanding RINO vision for our party of being "candidate centric" by refusing to fight for tax cuts insteadand refusing to isolate McDermott as a high-taxing, big-spending former Democrat merely pretending to be a Republican so he can avoid the long line at Democrat HQ and be a big fish in our small GOP pond. WARNING: Future GOP candidates with genuine Republican leanings have no reason to step forward if the party acts like it doesn't have their back by at least pretending to be remotely conservative. Giving McDermott a huge pass will backfire badly.

Yes, taken to its logical conclusion, watching our party's standard-bearer for 2018 push for billions in taxes (and going unchallengedby party leaders) is exactly what "candidate centric" looks like. RINO's want the Hawaii GOP to continue being the party that believes in nothing. So, by now, if you still don't believe that Saiki and Hellreich are still keeping the Hawaii Republican Party on the sidelines so that RINO's and Democrats can win, you'll probably never believe it.

SIGN OF THE APOCALYPSE???: You know things have gotten really bad when Crazy Tom Berg threatened before sunrise yesterday to run against RINO Bob McDermott.

So, when Helen Keller and Tom Berg do more to stop McDermott from burning down the Hawaii GOP than the 'leadership team' of new and recycled old party leaders, 2018 already appears quite bleak.

Look out, Democrats. Here come our 2017-19 party leaders. Or not.

Fellow Republicans, if you don't want the downward trend to continue, help HIRA pressure the officers of the Hawaii GOP toabandon "candidate centric" stupidity. It's time we stood for something and fought like crazy to save Hawaii from the destructive policies of the Democrats. All the issues are on our side, depending which 'side' one is really on. It's time that Republicans laid down the gauntlet and made the case to get rid of Democrats; not make the Democrat case for them.